Clarifying West Hartford Pension Woes

LETTER TO THE EDITOR:

February 01, 2013

Clarifying West Hartford Pension Woes

The Jan. 30 article "West Hartford Tries To Catch Up To Underfunded Pension Plan" [www.courant.com]  discusses an issue faced by many municipalities and the state of Connecticut. While I prefer to look for solutions rather than for someone to blame, I would like to correct Deputy Mayor Shari Cantor's statement, "We had a 13-year hiatus in paying anything to the pension plan. It was done under a Republican administration to reduce the burden on taxpayers."

In fact, under a Democratic administration in 1991, the town stopped adding funds to the pension plan when it was well funded at 125% of expected liabilities. That decision continued under both Democratic and Republican administrations until the plan dropped below 100% in 2003.

Despite making the required contributions, the plan dropped steadily for the past 11 years. Other factors contributed to the underfunding of the plan since 2003 -- the unrealistic 8.5% return assumption, fewer town employees on the payroll contributing into the plan, and retirees living longer. Unfortunately, it will be impossible to recover from the damage done and bring our funded status above the current 44.2% unless we address union contracts that provide overly generous benefits.